Arizona Sues EPA Over Pollution Controls at Coal Plants

Feb 4, 2013

(Reuters)

Arizona challenged in federal court U.S. environmental regulators efforts to force Arizona power companies to spend up to $1 billion to install pollution control equipment at three coal plants to reduce haze in the region's national parks.

Arizona's Attorney General Tom Horne said in a statement last week the emission control measures proposed by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) would not affect health or be reduce emissions visible to the human eye. "This is an absurd action that would significantly raise utility rates for most Arizonans without providing any benefit to anyone," Horne said in a statement.

Officials at the EPA were not immediately available for comment. On behalf of the Arizona Department of Environmental Quality, which filed a plan to reduce emissions in 2011 that was replaced by the EPA's proposal, Horne filed with the U.S. Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals challenging the EPA's plan to impose new haze restrictions.